


Every Hour on the Hour

by theyalwayssay



Category: Supernatural
Genre: Alternate Universe - Fairy Tale, Clocks, Destiel - Freeform, Fairy Tale Elements, Fluff, M/M
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2013-10-30
Updated: 2013-10-30
Packaged: 2017-12-30 22:29:33
Rating: General Audiences
Warnings: Creator Chose Not To Use Archive Warnings
Chapters: 1
Words: 2,575
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/1024128
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/theyalwayssay/pseuds/theyalwayssay
Summary: <blockquote class="userstuff">
              <p>There's an old woman who lives at the top of a mountain. If you are wise, and strong enough to walk up to that little wooden cottage on the mountaintop, she will build you a clock. A clock that tells all.</p>
            </blockquote>





	Every Hour on the Hour

There is an old woman who lives in the Alps. Some say that she is blind, some say she is deaf. Some say that she might even be both. But everyone knows that she has a fat ginger cat that likes to lie in the workshop window sun, and that if you want to purchase from her, you must first walk up the mountain…

…For she can only build what you want when you are standing before her. She’ll stand, squat as a toadstool before you, and fix you with one beady eye as she looks you up and down. And then she’ll scowl and wave her hand and tell you to return in a day. Or a week. Or a month or a year or ten. Every single customer is different. And no clock is ever the same.

The woman builds cuckoo clocks. No one knows how she makes them, as her eyesight is going and the joints of her fingers are protruding and bulbous, connected by a single thread of skin stretched over bone, but somehow the skeletal hands shape the wood and line up the little gears and set the clock ticking toward whatever stops it. Because these clocks do not simply tell time. A winemaker from Nice requested a clock that would tell him when his grapes had reached the perfect age in their barrels, and was rewarded with a bunch of grapes to hang on the wall, each individual fruit timed to a barrel of wine, turning from green to a deeper and deeper purple, finally falling from the stem when the wine is ready, and bouncing along the floor with a wooden clatter. A young woman, the heir to a Russian empress, asked for a clock that would tell her when the winter snows would cease, and was given a perfect wooden replica of a beautiful white rabbit. As the snow grew thinner and thinner on the sleeping spring grass, the rabbit’s fur would turn from snowy white to brown, and when the last of the harsh winter had ceased, it would curl up its little clockwork limbs and fall fast asleep, to whiten and reawaken when the snows began to fall again. A third customer, a renowned astronomer, asked for a clock that would show the exact position of the stars. He received a deep blue orb made of pure frosted glass, with hundreds of diamonds embedded in it, magnifying the pure white light that glowed from the very center of the orb. When a single star glowed brighter than all the rest, the scientist set up his telescope and gazed at the pinprick of light situated perfectly overhead. Such was the nature of the clocks. Some said they were magic. Some said they were the work of science. And still others said that they were fate.

There was a man at the brightly painted cottage door. He said that it must be painted so beautifully to welcome those who had the audacity to climb the mountain. It was a long way, certainly, but worth what he was coming for. He knocked on the door sharply. Three times.

 _Tap! Tap! Tap!_ The door opened.

It was not the old woman he had been told about. It was a man, a man with black hair instead of grey, and blue eyes instead of beady. He stood tall, just a little bit shorter than he, and the rolled-up sleeves of his stained white work shirt indicated that he was not a simple man of brains.

“I am looking for the Clockmaker,” the customer said. “Is she here? I wish to speak with her.”

The man nodded and stepped aside, sweeping a welcoming hand towards the interior. The customer walked inside, looking about, slipping out of his coat as he did so. The room was cheerful, lively, dozens of large windows letting in the shining mountain sun, a field of small yellow flowers spread out on the sweeping green hillside.

“ _Castiel! Ist es ein Kunde?_ ” a hoarse voice called from behind an intricately carved wooden door. The customer’s eyes narrowed, unused at he was to the foreign language.

“ _Ja, Urmacher_ ,” the man replied, wiping his greasy hands on the leather apron he wore.

“ _Dann sag ihm, dass es noch ein Moment dauert bis ich ihn begrüßen kann_.”

“ _Ja_.”

The man stepped closer to the customer, weaving around a small pile of crates beneath a flower box.

“Forgive me. She does not like when she is distracted from her work.”

“Is that German that you’re speaking?” the customer replied. The man bowed his head politely.

“The Clockmaker wishes that I address her in her native tongue. Being a mere assistant, there’s no reason to ask otherwise of her.” The customer nodded, and stood in the middle of the bright room, waiting quietly.

The Clockmaker appeared moments later, leaning on an old, gnarled walking stick that looked as though it had been modeled after her wizened fingers. She wore her curly silver hair in a tight bun, and had a pair of gold pince-nez perched lopsidedly on her crooked nose. She looked as though she were melting like fleshy candle wax, her earlobes, neck, and chin drooping nearly comically, but her beady black eyes still bright, alive as a lemming’s.

“What is your name, child?” she asked with a heavy accent.

“Dean Winchester.”

“You are not from these parts, Dean Winchester. That is not the name of a Swissman.”

“No, ma’am. But I have come a long way, and I have climbed the mountain as you require to make a request of you.”

“Request,” she said scathingly. “I make no requests. I make payments, jobs. Requests are for relatives, for people who care about you. I do not care. You have money?” she snapped. Chastened, Dean pulled out the Swiss notes from his back pocket. The Clockmaker snatched it from him and squinted intensely at it through the small panes of glass propped up on her nose. “This is blood money, boy, is it not?” she asked, shaking the notes in her fist. “I am an old woman, but it is clear as day. Any decent woman would turn you from the shop immediately! …It is a good thing, I suppose, that I’m not a decent woman,” she continued, walking towards a small flat box sitting atop a crate and placing the money carefully inside. “What do you want, boy?”

“I am a bit of a hunter, you see, ma’am,” Dean replied. “I track the ghouls and spectres that haunt the houses and chapels in the village, and see that no harm comes to the people. But I am sometimes too late. I would like a watch that can tell me when the next monster is going to strike.”

The Clockmaker looked at him, clicking her tongue against one thin, dry lip. She shook her head with finality. “No. No, not what you need. Silly boy. I cannot make that for you. It is impossible.”

“But…but you are legend,” Dean said, beginning to wring his hands before him, stretching and pulling at his fingers. “You created a clock that could tell someone when they were going to be born, or when they were to die. It can’t be impossible.”

“So much rely on chance,” she said emphatically, raising one finger to the young man pedantically. “Chance, dear boy. Death and life, they do not stop for anything of nature. The heavens, the tides, the snows and springs are all as precise as clockwork. And so clockwork can measure them. But spectres? No, no, child. They are not of this earth. They operate on a different plane, different dimension. A clock would be useless. Not what you need. But for you, I know what you need. You will return in a week.”

“But if you can’t make the clock I need…”

“I _will_ make the clock you need. And you will receive it in a week. Be gone.”

Dean looked towards the assistant, who made a hopeless gesture, his eyes sad. Looking bad once more at the old woman, Dean turned his back and walked back out the door. At the very least, a downhill journey might not be quite so tedious.

***

It was as though it was even more difficult the second time. Dean huffed and panted, the crisp mountain air crystallizing in his lungs, every blade of grass seeming to reflect the perpetual sun. But he could see the cottage now, shining like a beacon, and we was close, so very close, to quenching the curiosity that had plagued him all this time; what on earth could it be that the renowned Clockmaker thought he needed so very badly?

The little bell jingled as he opened the door, but no one seemed to be in the shop.

“Excuse me,” he called, but there was no answer. “Is anyone here? _Hallo?_ ”

There was a crash and a bang from behind the door, followed by a slight tinkling of glass. The workroom door was thrown open, and the Clockmaker stepped out, wielding her walking stick as though it were a club.

“ _Wer ist da ? Wieder widerliche Kinder die in meine Werkstatt einbrechen!_ ”

Dean raised his hands defensively. “It’s only me! I’m here for my clock!”

“Ah,” she said, lowering the walking stick slightly and staring at him with one beetle-black eye. “Yes, yes, of course. It is right here.”

Reaching behind her, the woman let go of her walking stick, causing it to clatter onto the floor, and reached into the flowerbox under a window. Dean thought for a moment that perhaps she’d forgotten he was there, when she straightened up and turned around, revealing an enormous red rose bud, as big as the head of a small child. “It had to harden under the sun, you see. For the lacquer,” she explained, handing it to him. He took it, surprised at its girth. It was a beautifully constructed thing, each petal carved in perfect wooden detail, the petals seeping from deepest burgundy to rich pink, and sprinkled with a light dusting of glass dewdrops.

“What does it measure?” Dean asked, staring at it.

“It measures love, child. When the flower is in full bloom, your love will be beside you.”

Dean jerked his head up, staring at the woman. “I don’t want it,” he said.

“I’m not interested in whether you want it,” she replied, thumping her walking stick on the floor. “I already have your money anyway, you can throw it down the mountain for all I care. But I can assure you that this is what you need.”

“If you can’t build something that measures spectres, how can you make something that can measure love?” Dean asked, looking askance at the display in his hand.  
“Love is everywhere, idiot boy!” she screeched. “It is in the plants, the animals, the air we breathe, every last drop of water. It flows through us like a river, just waiting to be drained of fish. It is a human concoction, and lives in our hearts and souls. Ghosts, spectres and ghouls, they are not from our world. They have no place here, no use for us. They are here by accident. But the seasons, the stars, winter spring, love, death and sorrow, they all belong to us. They are ours, and it is our privilege to see them work.”

Dean did not reply, only stared silently down at the rosebud in his hand.

“I feel,” the woman said, walking towards him and patting the back of his hand. For the first time, she sounded like an old woman. “I feel as though you’ve lost someone, child. Someone has been taken from you. A family member, perhaps? A mother, a sister?”

“My brother,” Dean replied. His voice was thick, and he had to clear his throat.

“Oh, child,” she said, patting his hand and nodding. “You have been running all this time. Chasing after things that don’t care whether you catch them or not. You’re looking for something that you cannot find in an old building, or in the heart of a guilty man. What you are looking for, is what I have given to you.”

The woman reached for her mottled neck and pulled out a long, gold chain, on which hung the tiniest of golden keys, as though stolen from the paws of a mouse when it was trying to unlock a dollhouse door.

“I hope this will illuminate you,” the woman said, and wound up the clock in Dean’s hands.

For a moment, all was still except for the whirring and click of gears.

And then the clock burst open, revealing a throat of the deepest violet, and a single jeweled bee crawled to the edge of a petal, its faceted diamond eyes glistening.  
“I thought it wasn’t meant to open yet,” Dean said, who had jumped in surprise at the clock’s opening, and had nearly dropped it.

“What do I know?” the Clockmaker said, although she looked as though she might be smiling. “I am an old woman, boy, I get things wrong! Perhaps love has found you already. I only hope for all our sakes that it isn’t me!”

“But I don’t understand, there isn’t anyone…” Dean said, looking about the shop frantically. The smallest of movements behind the door caught his eye. The assistant, Castiel, was watching from the workshop doorway. Upon realizing that he had been spotted, he stepped further out into the room, looking sheepish. His black hair hung down over his pale forehead, his eyes blue and icy, like a perfect winter sky, or a forget-me-not peeping through a crack in mountain rubble. His arms were exposed, strong and lean, with gear grease under his fingernails. But it was the way he stood. Like a soldier. Like a child. Like a man who had seen everything, and yet wanted to remember none of it. Like an old man, one of the old men who sigh as they smoke their pipes and lean back in their rocking chairs, ‘I’ve seen much, and I am old.’ old in the sense that a mountain is old, or the ocean. Unshakable, unmovable. But so lovely and untouchable. His eyes blazed with a light, the light of years and candlelight and stars. And behind that light…one who would very much like to leave the mountain.

“Keep the clock.”

“Excuse me?”

“Keep the clock. And the money, too.”

Dean handed the clock back to the Clockmaker, who looked up at him with a mixture of irritation and resignation. Dean straightened up, walking towards the carved door. He turned the handle, stepped outside. The air came to greet him, humming and whistling as it zipped over the grass and flowers before flying joyfully into his expanded lungs. He looked back at Castiel.

“ _Komme mit mir._ ”

Come with me.

Come with me.

The words ticked in a waltz, the hands twisting and turning on the face, the eyes peeking through as they watched the countdown. Castiel’s eyes widened, his mouth open in surprise, but he made no move towards the door. Perhaps the mountain was not yet ready to move from its perch.

And then his glassy eyes cracked into a warm smile.

When the customer left the shop of the Clockmaker, he left with neither clock nor money. 

But in the end, Castiel followed him all the way down the mountain.

**Author's Note:**

> Look at that, not a new chapter for Promised Land, but a new fic despite that! You can't deny, that's pretty impressive. And yes, I may have lost sleep over this, but it was so worth it. Leave a comment if you have any constructive criticism!


End file.
